The invention pertains to a functional unit for a vacuum system for the treatment of disk-shaped workpieces, comprising treatment chambers with openings in the chamber walls which can be sealed by swing valves; with holes for the leak-tight lead-through of the accessory equipment and connections required for the treatment of the workpieces such as electrodes for sputtering, glow discharge, and etching and lines for heating, process gas, and cooling; and with a transport device for conveying the workpieces through the treatment chamber.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,346,513 discloses semiconductor component production unit which has a carrier chamber with a hexagonal outline. Several reaction chambers and several replacement chambers are flanged to the side walls of the carrier chamber, and a manipulator is provided to convey the workpieces through the functional chambers.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,090,900 discloses a vacuum system for the treatment of workpieces which comprises at least one process chamber for the workpieces and a central distribution chamber is also known. The workpieces are fed into the distribution chamber through locks by means of a transport mechanism and removed again after treatment. An intermediate chamber, which can be evacuated, is installed between the distribution chamber and the process chamber, at least one of which is provided.
European Patent No. 452,778 discloses individual process chambers flanged to the side walls of a polygonal main chamber. A manipulator housed in the main chamber transports the workpieces from the first to the next treatment chamber. This prior functional unit is made of pieces of sheet metal. The pieces are designed in such a way that the entire unit can be assembled with a minimum of welds.
A disadvantage of all these known functional units is that the individual chambers are assembled from a large number of cut sections of sheet metal or individual castings. This means that the fabrication process is laborintensive and thus cost-intensive. Another disadvantage is that a genuine modular construction system is not possible, because different coating processes also require different functional units, but these cannot be realized on the basis of the known polygonal main chamber, especially when a plurality of substrates, which are held in common by one substrate carrier, are to be treated simultaneously.